Notes: I´m sorry this took so long to update, but I think you'll notice that this chapter it slighly different from the others...I found myself a really amazing beta, so I'm glad to announce that my mistakes have been fixed :D I want to thank Nik, here . at . the . end and Disney's Darling for your amazing reviews and great support, and specially, I want to thank Swing girl at heart, because she's an amazing, amazing beta!

Again, sorry for the long wait, and I hope you enjoy!

ps. The song is I'm Alive, from the Next to Normal musical.


I like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no principles better than anything else in the world.


Contrary to popular belief, Sebastian loves people.

Even if he doesn't show it most of the time, the thing he likes the most in the world is being surrounded by people. He loves the attention, the looks, the smiles, everything. He loves the tingle of electricity than runs through his body every time skin comes in contact with skin. He loves the hands touching him and lips kissing him and voices murmuring his name.

It reminds him of home, somehow. Of simpler times when his mother would flaunt him around in parties, for everyone to see, everyone to touch, and everyone to admire.

Being alone is never an option – unless he's too high to care- because being alone means thinking about why is nobody there with him.

And that – he has the dignity to admit it – is because he's a horrible person. You're sick, you're corrupted.

But not for the reasons you think, father.

.

"I'm not sure this was a good idea."

"Oh, come one Nick, don't be like that, try it once more. Just look at Jeff!"

"This was the most awesome idea ever!"

Jeff stares at Sebastian with wide reddened eyes, and a smile that lights up the room. "You," he says, almost screaming "You are amazing. You are so, so… alive! I am so alive right now! So alive!"

Sebastian bolts up, laughing loudly, and begins to sing as he spins and spins around the room.

"I'm alive, I'm alive I am so alive, and I'll tell you the truth if you let me try. You're alive, I'm alive, and I'll show you why I'm alive, so alive..."

David stands up, too, and dances and sings along with Sebastian, and they sing louder and louder until they are all dancing around the room, the joint passing from hand to hand, to finally end up as ashes somewhere on the table.

Not one hurtful word leaves Sebastian's lips. No mocking, no bitterness, no arrogance. And it's so much fun, that Sebastian has to wonder what would happen if he were to be like this all the time - happy and good, like them.

"I like you so much better when you're like this." Thad whispers, once they're all worn out, as he snuggles closer to Sebastian on the couch.

And by this, Sebastian thinks, you mean high.

Of course, because no one really likes Sebastian when he's being himself.

.

"Why is it that you're always alone?"

Sebastian looks up and smirks at the boy that towers over him.

"I'm not. You just happen to always find me on those strange moments when I am." Blaine looks away, unsure, and Sebastian can't help but smile a little. "Take a seat, killer."

Blaine's smile has the ability to light up his whole face, and Sebastian, as it's becoming quite usual, can't seem to look away.

"What are you doing here? I though the Dalton gardens were too big for anybody to find me."

"It's difficult not to find you, Sebastian" Blaine smiles as he takes a seat next to the other boy "I miss this place. I miss... the feeling I have when I'm here. I've been trying to not come by so often, but as hard as I try, I just can't help it."

Sebastian raises his eyes to the marvelous building before them and digs his fingers into the fresh grass underneath him.

"It's just a place, like any other place. It has walls and hallways and rooms and windows, like all the other places."

"But I was happy in this place."

Sebastian sees the Eiffel tower, all lit up against the night's dark sky.

"Then come back." He's not sure who he's talking to.

"I can't. I made my choice and I don't regret it. Kurt is...wherever he is, is where I belong."

Sebastian scoffs. "That's bullshit."

Blaine stares at him with wide eyes, and frowns. "What's up with you?"

"I just don't get it. Why one person? Why waste your time in just one person, when you can have anyone you wanted? When you can have them all?"

"There's just one person that I want."

Sebastian stares at him, sea green eyes red and slightly unfocused, but there's longing somewhere in there, the kind of longing that you just can't hide.

"Is there really?"

Their eyes meet, and, for a second, neither of them can look away. Sebastian can see that Blaine's eyes are focused on his, as if they were the most amazing thing in the world. The ex Warbler catches his breath slightly, but it's enough for Sebastian to notice, and he has the feeling that the world could be crashing around them, but Blaine wouldn't even care.

"I could save you" Blaine whispers softly, as he leans forward.

Then the world crashes, somehow. He looks away, eyes filled with regret, and something inside Sebastian stings as if he had been bitten -in the bad way.-

Of course, he thinks bitterly, but you already saved someone else.

"I...I'm going to say hi to the guys."

Sebastian watches him stand up and leave hurriedly towards the main door, and a laugh escapes his lips. It's not bitter, not sad, not mocking, is just a laugh, he laughs because he has suddenly come to a realization.

Blaine Anderson – he doesn't think of him as Blaine Warbler anymore – would never love someone like him.

But that's not even the important part – the important part is that Sebastian wouldn't love someone like himself.

.

He sleeps with Allen's best friend.

Then he realizes that Allen doesn't really have a best friend, so he sleeps with all the girls in his little group, and with all the guys that are either gay or bi-curious and are not afraid of Allen.

Well, most of them are, but Sebastian can be very persuasive.

He pops a pill into his mouth, just to be less himself and more… someone else, but the feeling only lasts a few fucks and a couple of dances and he has to do it again, and again and again until he has no pills left.

The world spins around him and there are hands touching him and people breathing in his ear and tongues sliding over his neck. He presses his body to whoever he's dancing with, or fucking at that moment and it all feels the same to him. Skin and moans and ragged breaths.

These people – they are just like him. They don't care enough and they judge too much and they want everything right here and right now, and it doesn't matter who they have to take it from, and it doesn't matter if they have to take it by force. This is the kind of people he likes, really, the people that don't make him feel like he's a horrible person.

He can feel someone pushing him hard against a wall, and his back hurts, but he's too gone to care, and his limbs and arms hurt too much to move and his sight is blurry and his head is spinning and all he can hear is a loud beeping sound that's beginning to give him a headache.

"Fuck off or I'll rip you in half."

The voice is calm and cold, and even if it seems to come from somewhere down the alley, mixed with all the music and voices from the bar, Sebastian recognizes it. The sweaty body pressed against him is suddenly gone, and the cold night air hits his face, and he takes a deep breath, his lungs burn as if he hadn't breathed in a log time, and he wonders if maybe he had, really, stopped breathing.

"Fuck, Sebastian, what the fuck did you do?"

"Allen…" Sebastian raises his eyes, but he can only see a dark silhouette moving towards him "I…"

"Shut up! Shut the fuck up, you fucking brat! What the hell did you think you were doing? Have you lost your fucking mind?"

Sebastian tries to push himself off the wall, but sways, and his knees give in, and he ends up sprawled on the floor.

"I... I don't know. I don't know."

For the first time in his life, he doesn't know what to say.

"God, you're stupid."

In a second, Allen is beside him, pushing strands of sweaty hair out of his face with one hand and holding him up with the other.

"I screwed you over." Sebastian manages to say. I broke your heart, is what he means.

He never cared about that before.

But he does now.

.

Once a Warbler, always a Warbler.

His eyes travel over the inscription, and his fingers trace the letters, sewed with golden thread to the Dalton standard that covers one of the walls of the rehearsal room.

"I didn't know what it meant when I arrived here." Someone says from the doorway.

Sebastian curves his lips in a crooked smile, but his eyes never leave the writings. "And you know now?"

Nick laughs and sits down on one of the large sofas, staring absentmindedly at the paintings decorating the room. "I found out, eventually. It's pretty simple."

Sebastian turns around, and Nick almost flinches at how pale and worn out he looks. "What does it mean?"

"It means that it doesn't matter what happens from now on, you won't ever be alone."

"And what if you mess up?" Sebastian sits down on the sofa next to Nick and stares at him with pleading eyes "What if you're not worth it?"

Something in Nick's eyes changes, they seem to darken for a moment, focused on Sebastian, and Sebastian has been in this situation too many times not to know what he's thinking.

You're so fucking beautiful.

"You are worth it. Never let anyone tell you that you're not."

Sebastian stares at him, and his eyes soften for a second, and they are greener and deeper and more beautiful than anything Nick's ever seen. So he leans in and kisses him.

Sebastian pulls away almost instantly, eyes wide. "You can't do that. You're, you have a..." He's more disappointed than surprised, and even though he has never cared about that, he somehow cares now.

"I know, I'm sorry, it's just… I couldn't help myself. I mess up sometimes too, you know."

"So it's not just me." A small smile graces Sebastian's lips, and he lets himself fall back against the velvet cushions.

"Nah, it's not just you."

.

"Isn't he beautiful?"

"Look at those eyes! You've got the most beautiful eyes, Sebastian."

"You are so, so beautiful..."

"You're so damn hot,"

"There's no one as beautiful as you."

"You're too hot to be weak,"

The boy that stares back at him from the mirror has dark marks under his eyes, and hickeys and bruises all over his neck. His eyes are slightly red and his hair is all messed up. There's nothing beautiful about him.

"You have no morals," he murmurs, frowning at the boy in the mirror. "You have no principles. You're careless and reckless and you're going to end up killing yourself."

Of, fuck, no, he doesn't want that.

"You're going to end up alone then."

He doesn't want that either.

"This is why people love you," he says, pressing one finger to the mirror where his eyes are reflected. "Bright eyes and thin lips and fucking beautiful face. No one would love you if you were ugly."

Of course not.

"You're so fucking beautiful," he whispers. You're so fucking ugly. And his eyes burn with unshed tears.

But he's the bad guy of the story, and the bad guy never cries.

But it's better to be the bad guy – Thierry used to say – than to be just an extra passing by.